DAVAO CITY, Philippines – Charges of serious illegal detention were filed against a 63-year-old woman who allegedly snatched a two-year-old girl in a shopping mall here last week.
Mayor Rodrigo Duterte ordered the police to put the suspect, Juditha Antero, behind bars at the Sta. Ana police station for having illegally taken the girl, who was last seen with her parents and two elder sisters at the mobile phone section of Gaisano Mall on the afternoon of Feb. 10.
Antero alleged she only took fancy of the girl who she saw loitering in the mall and that she thought she was alone.
Antero said she turned over the girl to the Davao City Women and Children Protection Office last Friday afternoon after she learned on the Internet that her parents were looking for her.
Duterte turned over the child to her parents Friday night and instructed the police not to release Antero anymore.
Duterte said Antero was just making an alibi when she said she did not know what to do with the child when she could have easily turned her over the police or even the mall management.
Duterte said he remembered Antero as having been accused of killing her husband in the 1980s when he was still a government prosecutor.
Antero herself said Duterte was the fiscal who handled the case against her.